Day 10. Fish Market, Skytree, Birthday -TripleWin.

Day 10. Fish Market, Skytree, Birthday -TripleWin.
(once again, this one is heavy on the photos)

Again, we woke early determined to get a spot in the Tsukiji Fish Marker auction. We bypassed the hassle of a train and got the hotel reception to call us a taxi. We arrived at just after 4am and made our way to the admin office where we waited outside in the freezing cold with a few other tourists. It was so cold we had to get some hot vending machine coffee. I used mine as a hand warmer rather than drinking straight away which regrettably made it cold and even less palatable when I finally drank it about 10 minutes later.
When they finally let us inside the waiting hall, there was already a full group inside ready for the first session of the auction. Lucky we got there when we did, as only a few minutes later was the hall filled.
A video was looping continuously on an old CRT television inside the hall and being up the front we had to listen to it repeatedly as it attempted some not-quite-right English. We got given a visibility vest and some information handouts to read while we waited. The wait was long.

I don't know if I've seen Chris look so tired. I shuddered to think what I looked like, even after the 'coffee'.
We were in the second session so when the first group were ushered through at 5:25am, we still had another 25minute wait before we could go through. I lost count of the number of times the video had looped when the door finally opened again and we were lead outside by one of the guides to get to the Tuna auction shed. Along the way could be seen the signs of lots of activity.

 

By the looks of things, the people actually working here must have been up and about a lot earlier than we were. The small group of about 60 or so of us were herded into a small roped off observing 'lane' between the tuna auction and another floor space. Fish were everywhere.

Lined up ontop of pallettes all up and down the floor, the whole tuna had their fins removed and a slice made a little way up their tails. This was to allow buyers a chance to inspect the meat for texture and colour.

 

 The buyers had small sickles with which they could gouge out a small piece of fish and feel and smell the flesh to see if it was what they were looking for.

 

There were constant reminders around the place that distracting behaviour towards the auctioneers or buyers was frowned upon.

 

At this stage, there wasn't a whole lot of noise in the area as most of the people around were just buyers inspecting the wares.

 

I was caught a little unawares when some guys in hats and blue shirts literally popped up amongst the crowd and starting ringing bells but everyone there seemed to know what was going on and shuffled around to various places within the shed.

Amongst the bell ringing and the talking, the atmosphere around us became quite lively, although not to the point of some other auctions I've attended.  

  

Once the fish had all been spoken for, they were labelled,  and the pallettes dragged off.

 ...only to be replaced by more pallettes a little further up the floor where the auctioneers dragged the crates they had been standing on and the whole thing began again.

 Some of the buyers were feeling a bit tired too.

 After all the whole fish were auctioned off, smaller cuts of meat were put on the block.

Here is a video of the auction:
http://youtu.be/VlQ3ZBXHpzU

 The other floor space looked like it was getting ready for some action too, and much larger fish were getting wheeled in behind us.

 We didn't get a chance to see this as the guide ushered us out the other side of the shed and we headed back to the admin office.

 Along the way we a few of us were nearly killed by these small orange motor carts which I can only describe as something akin to a forkless forklift mated to a bus steering wheel and kitted with the same power to weight ratio as a dodgem car. Scary stuff.

After handing back our vests, almost got backed over by a truck, and seeing so much fish we were getting hungry, so it was off to Tsukiji Sushi Sen again for another round of fishy breakfast.

This is what the restaurant looks like on the inside: http://youtu.be/ZAHYId_cvHg

This morning, the waiter that served us had some difficulty understanding our order, so instead of three complimentary entree sized bowls of miso soup like I got the day before, we all got main sized bowls of miso, plus the complimentary bowl for my set that I ordered (which was main sized as well for some reason). We tried our best but just couldn't even attempt the last bowl we left it for them to clean up. The sushi, again, was fantastic and I ordered an extra anago (salt-water eel) to go with my platter.
After breakfast we caught the train back to the hotel and while Chris and Estelle went back to the room to catch some z's, I tagged along with the others going to the Skytree. It was still quite early in the day so we had a better chance of getting tickets for a decent time of day. It was also a weekday so there was a chance there would be a vastly smaller crowd.

Well, there were definitely less people than when we tried last time. The line was only up to the inside of the doors, not stretching out to halfway down the outdoor courtyard. I might be exaggerating a little bit, but it was near enough. After about 30 minutes of crawling slowly forwards in a zig-zagging snaking line, we finally got to the ticket counter, where the extremely attractive ticket counter lady advised us that we could not buy the ticket to the very top viewing deck. We could only buy tickets to the 350m high Tembo Gallery level here, and if we wanted to go up to the 450m height, we would need to get the tickets up at the Tembo level. I had a feeling we were going to be spending a lot of time in queues.
..and I was right. After we aquired our 'tickets' we got to the gate which had only 2 lanes, each with a staff member ready to scan your ticket for you (because doing it yourself would just be way too un-Japanese). Once past the gate, we had to wait for the elevators, again in a line.
http://youtu.be/R9pK-Nvi1OA
There were 4 elevators, each with a different motiffe inside, and each able to take about 40 people per ride. Our previous experience at karaoke with elevators refusing to let us all on due to our combined weight had me a little worried about missing the ride.

Here is a video of the elevator up to the Tembo Gallery level: http://youtu.be/LgqTEDp_DnM

The following shots are all from the Tembo Gallery level.

 
On this level were large areas to take photos out of the windows, art murals, a restaraunt/cafe, and a bar. I felt a lot of the glass around waist to shoulder height was quite dirty and showed signs of scuffing and marking. I hoped the windows in the upper area fared better.

There were also a number of opportunities to get your photo taken professionally, even on your own device if you chose as in the following photo:

This lady was getting a photo of herself and a friend on her Samsung Galaxy S3. You did have to pay for it though, but it's nice to know there are options for those who don't wish to lug arround a camera all day.

 Afternoon sun in Winter was quite harsh coming into the tower, and it was hot inside. I found this quite annoying as I was dressed for the freezing winter outside.

It did make for some interesting shots though. I also found some of the iconography slightly more modern than anywhere else we visited, even if the sign for the bar looks like a soccer ref handing out a card.

  Tickets to the upper deck cost an additional 1000 yen over the initial 2000 yen but we figured we'd probably not come back to the Skytree for a very long while so we might as well not do things by halves.

Here's another video of the elevator ride up to the top: http://youtu.be/S2rBROlkaEM

Once on the upper deck, the crowds thinned out. The angles and views were better than below but the size of the windows and their distance set back from the barrier were a lot more restrictive for taking photos of the cityscape.

  

 I had no idea what the dog was saying:

Shout out to my peeps in the burbs back home:

There was also braille on some of the railings. We thought this quite strange considering that the view would be lost on someone with impaired vision or blindness, but hey, this was Japan.

Another paid photo opportunity station and Amelia getting a good photo bomb in.

 At first I thought this was a sign for the toilets but it's actually the mascot for the tower pointing you in the direction to go.

 The character appeared at various places and you could buy souvenirs incorporating the mascot.
 Views of large built up expanses of Tokyo were a lot easier to take from the higher vantage point and we could get some landmarks into frame that were hidden while looking out of the lower levels.

 A familiar Sumo stadium presented itself and the Asahi 'golden sperm' near Asakusa was easier to see.

 Apart from the view there wasn't much else on the top floor except for maybe this colourful waiting area near the elevator down.

 While waiting, we thought we'd try and get some HDR photos of the brightly lit background behind our underexposed subjects. It didn't quite work out.

 Maybe the iPhone would fare better. Dwayne didn't look impressed.

 The elevator came and this guy bid us all a fond farewell.

Back on the Tembo deck we discovered they had a glass floor level below so we decided to check it out. Not quite as impressive as I was imagining but the view was certainly vertigo inducing.

With the Skytree ticked off our list we headed back to the Hotel and I completely forgot to go to the Studio Ghibli store at the Skytree mall.

Once back at Unizo, the four birthday boys and girl got a surpise birthday cake. As it was Dwayne's birthday that day though, he got to blow out the candles.

 After a long day we were getting hungry so we decided to go out for some good old fashioned back alley food. We went looking down a street that seemed promising but upon closer inspection nothing seemed suitable.
We realised we were in the wrong area so we did some google searching and after some walking ended up in the right place. We quickly found a small, cramped stall that served yakitori and beer. It was more like a bar than a place to eat, and the BBQ was right at the entrance. We could see what we were about to eat getting cooked, but we also got a good facefull of smoke during the process. The place must have been connected to the restaurant behind the burner as the cook and the cashier were communicating with the people on the other side through a small window and handing food through to them. At one point, a girl stuck her head around the corner, which was really surprising because as far as I could tell there was no access around that corner. It was quite a strange place to be but I was too busy eating and drinking to take any photos.
Despite the tasty food (of which I don't know exactly what part of the animal it came from) and the cheap beer we left that place feeling slightly unfulfilled.

We went down the street a short way and found another place.I should point out that I was a bit drunk at this stage so I apologise if any of the following photos are blurry as I couldn't tell if the shutter speed was fast enough. It was very dimly lit inside.
The waitress led us upstairs (it was more a ladder than a staircase) and I had to try not looking at her butt on the way up (which was quite difficult given there was nothing else to look at apart from wooden walls either side).

 It was surprisingly warm upstairs, and gave off a cozy firetrap vibe.

Going by the clock, it would probably have been approximately 20 past 11 and 1 minute 21 seconds (but just approximately) and we were getting stuck into the longnecks.

 Food on order was fried, again, but we diversified with some char grilled veggies this time. I'm not sure if the beer made any difference but everything tasted really good (except those bowls of sliced brown something-or-other in the middle of table which we didn't touch).

 Jules seemed to like the beer and food.

 As did Estelle.

I was about to pass out. I probably should have taken off the beanie.
These photos are blurry.

 

And here we are leaving just after 3am.

 I'm not sure exactly what was going on downstairs, but that pot of whatever-it-was smelled delicious.

We paid the bill (which was ridiculously cheap) and all the time we were waving goodbye and saying goodnight I was futilely trying not to picture the waitress's butt.

 Even so far past midnight, there were still people out looking for a bite to eat.

I can't remember if we did anything after that but I presume we went back to the hotel and slept like babies.

Coming soon, Day 11: Bon Voyage.